British government bans burning of fetuses to heat hospitals

Published: 27 March 2014

The British government has imposed an immediate ban on the incineration of miscarried and aborted babies after journalists found cases of hospitals burning fetuses to generate heat, reports the Catholic News Service.

Dr Dan Poulter, parliamentary undersecretary of state for health, issued a March 24 statement that the burning of fetuses had been instantly prohibited following revelations by a team of investigative reporters working for the Channel 4 television program Dispatches.

The journalists used the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to make National Health Service trusts reveal how they had disposed of fetal remains in recent years.

They discovered that thousands of aborted and miscarried babies had been burned as clinical waste with some incinerated in on-site 'waste-to-energy' plants generating power to heat the hospitals.

'This practice is totally unacceptable,' announced Poulter, who worked in hospital obstetrics and gynecology before he became a politician. 'That is why I have asked Professor Sir Bruce Keogh, NHS medical director, to write to all NHS hospital trusts, to make it clear that it must stop now.'

He said in his statement that Dame Sally Davies, England's chief medical officer, has also written to the Human Tissue Authority, the regulatory body, to ensure 'that there is clear guidance on this issue.'